It's the end of the world as you know it – brought to you by a Gnome Mage with big balls of fire

Ask da Nome a Kwestion or 20 Bhlogdey Kwestions (Part 2)

The last installment in the Ask da Nome a Kwestion or 20 Bhlogdey Kwestions special involves some heavy duty questions from the heavy duty Gnome Fire Mage follower (and Fire Mage himself), Prelimar and the heavy duty Locktess with the Mostess, Syrana.

I will start of with Prelimar’s questions, then weave my way towards answering Syrana’s… assuming I have the energy… owwww, OK, I will find the energy….

Prelimar asks:

Q) I’m a recently-minted 80, and I need to start getting geared for endgame stuff. Where do you recommend I go, and what sort of pieces should I be looking for?

A) WoLK Gear for new level 80 Mages

There are a few schools of thought on gearing your freshly minted level 80 Mage. There is certainly no reason to worry about gear before 80, you could get to 80 in your starting (level 1) gear if you really wanted to, in fact I would recommend you keep that level 1 gray gear if you can… But I will come to that.

Probably the big warning is that some of the < 80 quest and reputation rewards are BiS for the new level 80, so don’t DE everything you pick up!

Same ol’ Fireball

I’m not going to reinvent the fireball, instead I will point you towards a couple of references I found invaluable.

The one thing to consider, especially if you follow the next gearing strategy, is that much of the gear, particularly the reputation gear will be irrelevant before you reach the required rep levels, or manage to clear the heroic more than once.

Now there are two other ways to get gear “starting” gear. The 1st is a hitherto undocumented reputation grind, which I will cover later under the M&S Reputation tag. The 2nd is the M&S mates rates method.

M&S mates rates gearing

Otherwise known as 6 degrees of separation gearing, this is the most sensible and most likely efficient method.

Strategy: Preferably before 80, but at 80 is fine, start buttering up everyone you know and thier pets. Make sure you are in a good guild, preferably friendly, but most important is progressed.

Hit 80 and sign up for every raid. 25 man Ulduar hard mode is not out of the question. Just camp the guild raid roster and make sure you are the 1st to sign up.

All being well, you will be invited and before you know it, you will be sporting T8.5 along with your TBC greens. Soon you will be as well geared as many of your guildies and no one will question your presence… In fact they will be begging your attendance.

All being well you will pick up so many achievements in the 1st couple of weeks you will be able to proudly flash your achievements at those PuG raid LFM requests. They don’t need to know you were dead on the floor within 5 seconds of entering combat!

I got lucky with this strategy when I was newly minted. I hadn’t even equipped all my vendor/AH gear, let alone gemmed and enchanted it before I was invited by my guild to Naxx 25. Within 2 weeks I had seen more Naxx bosses in general, Naxx 25 specifically and gained more iLevel 213 than my mates that had been at level 80 for months!

All being well you can skip Naxx and romp through Ulduar these days!

Q) Along the same lines,I also need to start grinding rep. besides the Sons of Hodir, who else should Igrind rep with? I’m definitely working on the oracles in sholazar basin, because I want a chance at the green proto-drake. Any others?

A) WoLK Reputation for mages

There area few reputation grinds that are important for you as a Mage. Some are practical and give gear or enhancements, others are important for the novelty value. Some people rightly rate novelty higher than practicality, we are Mages after all, thus more of a novelty than anything else.

Remember to equip your Reputation tabard of choice when hitting the heroics!

Kirin’Tor:

Practical: a weapon you will quickly replace, essential head enchants you may only get to use once or twice depending on raid progression and RNG – but they aren’t the sort of thing you can ignore.

Novelty: Spell enhancements, pay money to get new icons!

While Kirin’Tor should be a high priority, there is something to consider… You may be better off focusing on other rep gains. The Cooking and Fishing Dailies both award Kirin’Tor rep… and you will be doing those forever. I rushed my Kirin’Tor Rep, and now wonder why…

Wyrmrest Accord

Practical: Belt and boots. Both of which you will probably quickly replace. But if you are doing the plethora of dailies, this will come pretty quickly.

Novelty: Drake… Like there aren’t enough of them in the game.

Sons of Hodir

What a royal PITA!

There is only one reason to do these guys and that’s for the spell thread for your shoulders. In reality, the TBC Aldor/Scryer ones are just as good until you hit exalted. Even the Wintergrasp ones will do fine if you can’t be stuffed.

Ultimately you will feel the need to get a little bit more spellpower and this will be your only option, so here’s some tips:

You need to do about 17 quests in three chains before you can start earning rep with these guys.

Once you can, you only get a couple of dailies per reputation level, so get up the early levels of reputation, so rather than 2 dailies, you have 6.

If you are enjoying the grind (more power to you) go for it. However I would recommend you at least buy your way to Revered immediately so you get the full set of dailies.

Hound the AH and your mates for the rep turn ins. Don’t waste your life, unless you are really, really enjoying doing the dailies. Do you really have a month of dailies to get the rep?

Oracles etcPure novelty… Go for it, but be prepared to be frustrated with the RNG. Revel in every worthwhile egg you hatch. I haven’t even bothered, I am too busy shouftying raid spots.

The Kalu’akPractical: There is a cloak available at early levels, and the fishing rod is awesome. Not for fishing, who cares about that! No you want it for the underwater breathing!

Novelty: Penguin…

M&S reputation
Ultimately no ingame reputation matters as much as the one without a reputation bar. You need to be known in your guild and on your server.

While at 1st thought a good reputation would seem the best, a bad one is just as good, and is much easier to obtain.

Avoid ninja, magetard and thief reputation wherever possible, but ultimately as long as your name rings a bell, you will get plucked from LFG long before better skilled and geared characters.

Your name will live on long after your deeds are forgotten!

So troll the forums as your main. If you are trolling, you must be uber. Spam /trade and /general as much as possible. Be sure to blow your own trumpet. Link your Ulduar achievements that you earned through M&S mates rates raiding.

One thing to be very careful of, is to never display your real lackluster gear. This is where your starting gear comes in. If you don’t have that, pick up either:

A set of RP gear. If you look good, you must be good!

A terribad set of gear. As a Mage you would be looking for Agility, Spirit and Strength gear

Why?

Well you are smart enough to troll on your level 80… but you are also smart enough to be hiding your gear. They can’ troll you back for having less that BiS gear, when all you have is level 1 grays! That will stuff them, you will become a legend immediately!

Q) Any other things I should be doing as a new level 80? I’ve never been into PvP or battlegrounds, but I’d be willing to learn if I knew where to start, so if you are going to recommend something, consider me a total noob…

A) SHOULD?

Never should do anything! (Proper Grammar and all)

Just do what you want… whatever tickles your fancy… Have fun in your own way!

If you really want to do a bit of controlled PvP, then battlegrounds are a great way to learn the ropes of dying and running back into battle. Wintergrasp will probably be more rewarding, and perhaps a bit more forgiving. It really depends whether you really want to PvP, or just get a taste of it. One of the reasons Wintergrasp is so popular is that it is silly rewards for bugger all effort.

To get you started I would suggest either having a look through my old battleground guides, or just wait a little for the guides Wonzy is going to write… I dare say he will say it much better than I can.

Q) If you could pass your WoW legacy/torch to another when you “retire,” who would you hand it off to?

A) A Gnew Gnome in da House?

Well, what a doozy of a question… one that I don’t really have an answer for.

I guess the best answer would for me to power level Odin and get him to carry on my legacy… but I can’t find the RL heirloom shoulders anywhere… and to be honest I m enjoying his leveling process too much. I don’t want to wake up tomorrow an discover he is 18.

I guess I would hand it over to Prelimar… he has in the face of untold pressure to respec stuck with Fire… He may not be a Mage, but he’s certainly got the big balls Fire!

We shall see his “weekend that was” post next week…

Q) If Syrana could enslave Gnomes, would you replace her imp?

A) I think you have us Gnomes confused with Goblins!

Goblins could easily step in an replace your Imp…

Gnomes, well, there could only be one role for a Warlock’s Gnome companion…

Succubus!

Yep, we are hot, and funny, way too seductive… and we love to crack a whip!

Q) Do Gnomes really taste yucky?

However, i would just like to point out for all you lovely Gnomettes, Night Elf Laaadddies, and Human Honeys, that we just rub sump oil into our skin to act as Horde Repellent (registered trademark). No need to fear, us Gnomes are quite partial to a bubble bath, and we scrub up good… so feel free to come on down (to our level) for all your loving needs!

Q) Have you ever tried to get Mrs. Gnomer to play WoW?

A) Next Question…

Yes, many times. She has even suggested that she is willing but:

We only have one PC, and can’t afford a 2nd, or a second set of software and subscription.

She fears that if she was to start playing, she wouldn’t stop… Odin and house would be neglected. Admittedly if it wasn’t for her the house would be neglected… Odin can look after himself… we are toilet training him now, and he can make PlayDough hamburgers…

If she was to play, I wouldn’t be… and that’s my greatest fear!

I have actually assisted her in rolling one character… but her attention had already waned before we left the character creation screen. Give her Spider Solitaire, and she can play for hours, give her character creation and it’s snores before the faction has even been selected.

To be honest, I fear things would turn out as they have for Rhii. She probably wouldn’t want me to play with her… but if I didn’t, I would be the worst husband on earth again still.

Q) Are you a one game kinda Gnome?

A) I’m a one everything kinda Gnome!

One Spec

One Button

One Name

One Haircut

But as for games, yeah I play WoW and that’s about it. Even at LAN parties with my mates, more often than not I commit myself to WoW.

I don’t even possess a console type game.. I joke with my workmates that if I won one at our monthly raffle, I would have to trade it in for something for my wife… because there aren’t any power points in the gutter for me to connect it too!

Still… I do sneak in the odd game on my iPhone… iMob, iVampire, iKnights and Crazy Penguin Catapult 2 FREE are my current addictions… although they are more to satisfy my gamers twitch than for any real enjoyment…

Closing the door on the behind the scenes Gnomeaggedon

Well, that’ it folks… my secrets all reveal, my wisdom laid out for all to read.

I hope you got as much joy out of reading the questions and answers as I did in reading the questions and writing the answers!

If anyone has better, or alternate answers for Prelimar’s gear, Rep and time consumption questions… please tell!

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4 Responses

wow, i didn’t think i’d get ALL my questions answered, let alone so thoroughly! thank you! you are the gnome with the mostest. that must have been a ton of work, and i really appreciate it. i’ve been 80 for a bit over a month now, i think, and all your answers are hitting me at the right time, since i’m still looking for which gear is right for me, where to get it, and getting my feet wet in naxx & obsidian sanctum. (ulduar? what’s that? i’ve never even seen the zone it’s in, i bet, lol)

my guild is great fun to run with, so i’m sure we will all get to ulduar eventually, hopefully together, because i’m a PuG-o-phobe. too many bad experiences while leveling, i’m afraid.

as for “passing the torch”, well, i blush and am *extremely* flattered to even be mentioned, but we all know that there is only ONE mage with the balls o’ fire big enough to have a blog like this, and that is you. /bow

Ahh yes… when I realised I was going to have to have 2 bites at the cherry, I decided I would answer them all. Admittedly I slacked off on a real useful answer, and went a little silly… can’t have to many facts spoiling a good blog post…

Don’t worry… the only reason I know Udluar exists is I have hit the instances next door… and more often than not my mates and guildies are unavailable because they are in there… you can be assured that Iwill be using the mates rates gearing option in there… just because they will be farming it when I get a look in.

If you guild is good fun, you really don’t need anything else and I am sure you will get looked after… but don’t be too afraid of the pug raids.. it’s a rare day where there aren’t enough people to get you through… as long as you do you bit, you can at least hold your head high.